Police and Justice Bill

Indeed; my hon. Friend is right. The previous Home Secretary signed the treaty in Washington. We put it into force by statute, but the US did sweet nothing so there is no law to be executed on their side. We undertake our unfair and unequal treatment voluntarily. That sums up our current relationship with America—we jump, even when we do not have to. I shall cover some of our primary concerns about the proposals in the Bill. We have serious misgivings about the Government once again seeming to believe that crime can be tackled directly from the Home Office and giving powers to the Home Secretary to dictate the form and function of police authorities. The Government clearly want to match their new super-size police forces with police authorities newly reduced in size, but the proposals will reduce local accountability and take away independence and autonomy. The Bill allows for a reduction in numbers on authorities, theoretically down to one member. Tempting though that might seem to the Home Secretary, I do not believe that it is the purpose of the proposal. Under the present system, the appointment of local authority members to such a body should reflect the political balance on the appointing authority or authorities, so the idea that each principal authority should have one seat on the new police authority and that that person should be the lead member on community safety will inevitably mean that the composition will reflect the majority party on the local authority. Applied around the country, that will not lead to political balance of any sort. Political proportionality, which has long been a tradition on those authorities, will disappear unless it occurs accidentally. The other aspect of authority membership that concerns me is the removal of the magistrate members. They are a specified component of such an authority, and they will still be able to apply as independents. However, in the five years that I served on the Metropolitan Police Authority, I observed that the knowledge and experience that the magistrate members brought from the criminal justice system was invaluable in holding the police force to account. At a time when we are aiming for joined-up working and joined-up technology so that cases can be chased through from the police to the criminal justice system, the proposal seems a serious and unnecessary change for the worse. There will have to be an extraordinary justification or rationale for dispensing with such a valuable component of what is meant to be an independent authority holding the police to account for local people. Perhaps that is the problem—the magistrates are a bit too clever and might frustrate the Home Secretary’s direct intervention in future. The Home Secretary will be able to decide which issues a police authority looks into. That involves constraining the function of police authorities, which he will be able to control literally at will. If he believes that all or part of a police force is failing or may fail, he may direct the chief officer and/or the police authority to undertake specific measures to remedy or prevent such a failure, which will take place on his own cognisance. As has been said, in broadening the trigger that decides when he can direct police authorities, there is a risk that the power will be overused and misused. I would therefore welcome further explanation from the Minister on objectives, plans and reports for police authorities and on the Home Secretary’s new role in relation to issuing such directives. Once again, it seems that the Government are trying to diminish local accountability by allowing Whitehall to dictate, intervene and direct. The shift of control to the Home Secretary without the need for a negative report automatically means that there will be less accountability. Although the Minister may say that such interventional powers will be used only as a last resort, we do not have a definition of what the Home Secretary means by ““failing”” and ““last resort””. The power is a carte blanche for interference, and we need the Minister to clarify the terms ““failing”” and ““last resort””. At first sight, the mini-safeguard on public engagement appears to be an innovative and welcome step, because it gives the local authority scrutiny committee a role in examining how persons and bodies responsible for tackling crime and disorder carry out their functions. As a Liberal Democrat, localism and community involvement play into our fundamental philosophy of power to the people, but we must build in safeguards both for the community and for the police. A scrutiny committee sounds great in theory because local people know what is best for the local area, but there are concerns about whether the provision could be misused.